It’s easier than you might think
Starting a new role is stressful, whether an employee is changing roles, jobs, departments, or locations — or joining an organization for the first time. Learning new processes and adjusting to different expectations can be challenging and uncomfortable at any point in an employee’s career. As an employer, how do you create successful onboarding for your new hires? What can you do to make employees feel at ease, show them you care about their success and shorten their runway to full productivity?
Onboarding as part of an ongoing talent strategy addresses these concerns. Additionally, it has a huge impact on employee happiness. When done right, successful onboarding:
- Increases employee retention and company loyalty by 50%, which matters even more so because:
- 51% of U.S. employees say they’re actively looking for a new job or watching for openings
- More than half of employees who left jobs last year did so in their first 12 months
- Replacing one quitter costs $3,000 to $18,000
- Improves new-hire productivity and performance by 18%
- Enables 77% of new hires to hit their first performance milestone
What successful onboarding looks like
A systematic and comprehensive approach to onboarding improves employee experiences by:
- Building trust and providing an avenue for open communication
- Fostering employee engagement and connectivity
- Enhancing job satisfaction and retention
- Increasing efficiency and productivity to accelerate business growth
But successfully onboarding employees into a company, department or role involves more than one method, one person or one day. You need to connect employees to relevant people as soon as possible. Make sure they understand the defined expectations of the job.
Give them an overview of the company’s history, culture, and values, as well as the processes and procedures that impact their work to help them connect quickly, and on a more meaningful level. This is all possible with a repeatable, strategic plan in place that provides:
- A central location for important documents
- Easy form completion to help employees feel supported
- At-a-click information about company culture, job expectations and critical processes and procedures
- The ability for both employer and employee to track progress
- An engaging and personalized experience to make employees feel welcome and comfortable
The ideal onboarding experience bridges the gap between talent acquisition and talent management — in other words, it’s relevant from pre-hire to retire. It gets employees engaged (and keeps them engaged), relieves their stress, makes them feel comfortable and assures them that they’ve made the right career move.
Get our free e-book for more ideas
Want to learn more about creating successful onboarding at your organization? Download our e-book for practical tips on creating the ideal onboarding experience.
